1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to telephony or other audio or multimedia applications using personal computers or other processor-based hosts. More specifically, a system and method for automatic storage and retrieval of personal audio settings used with telephony or other audio or multimedia application software running on stand-alone or networked computers or other processor-based host systems are disclosed.
2. Description of Related Art
Telephone or computer headsets are used extensively by operators, customer service agents such as in call centers, and/or other professionals who frequently use telephones or computer telephony applications. In addition, headsets are not only used with telephony applications but are widely used in a variety of computer and other multimedia applications, particularly with the convergence of computer and telephony technologies. Examples of headsets designed to connect to computers or other processor-based hosts include those adapted for various applications such as computer telephony (generally referred to as softphones), voice recognition, language or speech learning, audio listening for music, training, video, etc., and video game systems.
However, conventional headset systems using personal computers or other processor-based hosts typically do not allow users to store or retrieve user-configured settings. Examples of user headset settings include headset model, inbound and outbound volume levels, tone, frequency response, and sidetone volume when the headset is used for telephony applications. Although some conventional headset systems may allow a user to configure and store certain user settings, such systems cannot save settings for multiple headset users or multiple headsets, whether on a network or on a stand-alone device such as a personal computer or other processor-based host.
Examples where multiple headset users may share the use of a processor-based host at, for example, a work station include call centers, customer relationship management centers, office environments, or residences where softphone or audio users do not have a dedicated personal computer or other processor-based host. Rather, multiple users share a processor-based host and each user simply uses the first or only available host. For example, call centers, and particularly those in expensive facility locations, are moving toward an open seating environment where employees do not have a dedicated or assigned station but use any available station. With open seating, an employee is assigned to any available station for the work day (or shift) and may be assigned to a different station the next work day. Thus, each work station is shared by multiple employees.
Although some proprietary Automatic Call Distributor (ACD) systems in call centers support open seating environments, such systems generally use a passive headset architecture without an opportunity to customize and store multiple headset settings for multiple users. In particular, the employee may configure various user settings for the headset system while at the assigned station. However, those settings are only stored locally, if at all, at the PC located at the assigned station. When the employee is assigned to a different station the next work day, those user-configured settings cannot be retrieved from that different station and thus are lost. The employee would thus need to reconfigure the settings as desired at the newly assigned station at the beginning of each work day. As is evident, such reconfiguration of settings that typically do not change for a given user is not only inconvenient for the user but is also inefficient and not cost effective for the business.
Some call centers and offices achieve the open seating environment using VoIP by providing each employee with a laptop computer which may store a single set of user settings locally. While such a system using laptops takes advantage of the open architecture for a VoIP or other softphone application and takes advantage of some of the cost savings associated with open seating, it requires assigning a dedicated laptop to each employee and thus does not achieve the optimal user convenience, system security, and cost benefits of using desktop PCs.
As another example, multiple members of a household may use one or more headsets on a shared PC. Each member of the household typically has a different set of desired headset settings. Although one member of the household may be able to configure and save his desired settings on the PC, those settings are lost and thus irretrievable when another member of the household modifies those settings. Again, the need for each member of the household to reconfigure the headset settings each time those settings are modified by another member of the household renders the headset inconvenient to configure and use.
Thus, what is needed is a system and method to automatically store and retrieve user audio settings for multiple users. Ideally, the system and method enable a processor-based host to store settings for multiple users and to automatically load the stored settings for a particular user when that user logs on, thereby resulting in convenience for the user and in cost efficiency where the system is used in a business environment.